Rez Dogs, first published in 2021 by Dial Books for Young Readers, was written by American author Joseph Bruchac. Rez Dogs is a novel for middle-grade readers written in verse. It tells the story of Malian, an eighth grade girl who shelters with her grandparents during COVID-19 and learns about her Wabanaki background.

Bruchac has been awarded many honors, including the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Native Writers’ Circle of the Americas. In 2023, Bruchac was chosen to be the inaugural poet laureate of Saratoga Springs, New York, and received a prestigious Academy of American Poets Laureate Fellowship.

The paperback edition used for this study guide was published by Dial Books for Young Readers, Penguin Random House LLC.

Content Warning: This guide discusses racism and genocide against Indigenous Americans as well as the legacy of forced assimilation within boarding schools.

Plot Summary

Malian, an eighth grader who lives in Boston with her Wabanaki parents, is visiting her grandparents on the Penacook Wabanaki reservation for the weekend when the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown hits, preventing her from going home. One morning, Malian awakens from a dream about a wolf-like dog to find a large dog sitting outside her grandparents’ home. She names him Malsum, which means “wolf” in the Wabanaki language. Malian’s grandparents tell her that Malsum, a rez dog, has chosen her, and they welcome him to their home.

Malsum looks fierce, but he is a gentle and loyal companion and protector who keeps a coughing mailman, bored reservation friends of Malian’s, and an unpleasant official from social services away from the house, protecting Malian and her grandparents from exposure to the COVID-19 virus and ongoing discrimination against Indigenous American individuals from the government.

Malian enjoys staying with her grandparents and falls in love with Malsum, but she misses her parents and worries about falling behind at school because of the spotty Internet connection on the reservation. To pass the time, Malian’s grandparents share stories and histories about Indigenous people that give Malian a deeper understanding of her heritage and the suffering that Indigenous people have experienced. They explain how COVID-19 is a reminder of past pandemics, such as smallpox, which decimated Indigenous tribes.

When a government official arrives to check on the “fitness” of Malian’s grandparent’s house, Malian’s grandparents share stories about generations of Indigenous children being torn from their families and sent to Catholic “boarding schools” in attempts to squash their traditional languages and culture. While looking through old photo albums, Malian sees pictures of Grampa Roy and Grandma Frances at their “Indian” boarding schools and learns that her own mother was taken from her “unfit” home and sent into foster care. Pictures of Malian’s father as a baby prompt stories about how he was their “miracle baby,” since Grandma had (unsuccessfully) undergone forced sterilization that Indigenous women endured under the government’s guise of a free “health checkup.”

Grampa Roy and Grandma Frances also share uplifting traditional Wabanaki stories and legends about rez dogs, creation, hunting, and cultivation that highlight the Wabanaki ideology of respect and humility toward all living things. Malian’s grandparents are emblematic of the Wabanaki spirit of giving and community, donating to the people of the Navajo nation who were hit hard by COVID-19 infections but were mostly ignored by the government.

Before COVID-19 travel restrictions lift, Ms. Mendelson, Malian’s eighth grade teacher, shares her own experience of misjudging a person based on race. In an effort to create positive change, she asks her students to present their own stories to bring their diverse community together through understanding. Malian shares a story about her Wabanaki heritage, ending with the statement that going forward they need to:

‘Take care of each other and take care of our land. We need to be kind to each other and to all living things, make the circle strong for those who come after us. Instead of standing up alone […] we need to bend our knees and touch the earth’ (178).

When Malian’s parents arrive to pick her up, Malsum gazes at her, bows, and runs into the woods. Malian wants to take Malsum to Boston with her, but she understands that rez dogs know where they are needed, and that they need to be free.